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27,299 commentary entries
The Pulpit Commentary
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:24-33
The prospect in the promised land. I. THE TREATMENT OF ITS FORMER OCCUPANTS. 1. The avoidance of their idolatries. God cautions us against those dangers which we are most likely to overlook. When once the Israelites ent…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:25
He shall bless thy bread and thy water. If the Israelites were exact in their obedience, and destroyed the idols, and served God only, then he promised to bless "their bread and their water"—the food, i.e; whether meat…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:26
There shall nothing out their young, nor be barren in thy land. This blessing could not have followed upon godly living in the way of natural sequence, but only by Divine favor and providential care. It would have rende…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:27
I will send my fear before thee. The fear which fell upon the nations is seen first in the case of Balak and the Moabites. "Moab was sore aft-aid of the people, because they were many" (Numbers 22:3). Later it is spoken…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:28
And I will send hornets before thee. This is scarcely to be taken literally, since no actual plague of hornets is mentioned in the historical narrative. "Hornets" here, and in Deuteronomy 7:20; Joshua 24:12, are probabl…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:29
I will not drive them out from before thee in one year. The Divine action is for the most part "slack, as men count slackness"—it is not hasty, spasmodic, precipitate, as human action is too often. Men are impatient; Go…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:31
And I will set thy bounds from the Red Sea even unto the sea of the Philistines. This passage by itself would be sufficient to confute Dr. Brugsch's notion, that the Yam Suph (or "Red Sea" of our translators) is the Lak…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:32-33
EXPOSITION FINAL WARNING AGAINST IDOLATRY. The "Book of the Covenant" ends as it began, with a solemn warning against idolatry. (See Exodus 20:23.) "Thou shalt make no covenant with them nor with their gods." Thou shalt…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:32
Thou shalt make no covenant with them. See below, Exodus 34:12-15. According to the forms usual at the time, a treaty of peace would have contained an acknowledgment of the gods of either nation, and words in honour of…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 23:33
They shall not dwell in the land. This law did not, of course, affect proselytes; nor was it considered to preclude the continuance in the land of the enslaved Gibeonites. It forbade any Canaanite communities being suff…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:1-8
COMPLETION OF THE COVENANT, AND ASCENT OF MOSES INTO THE CLOUD ON SINAI. EXPOSITION THE RATIFICATION OF THE COVENANT. The giving of the Book of the Covenant being now completed, Moses, having received directions with re…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:3-8
The terms of the covenant accepted. I. OBSERVE HOW CLEARLY THESE TERMS HAD BEEN STATED. Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the judgments. All the way to Sinai the people had the opportunity…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:3
And Moses came. Moses descended from the mount, and reported to the people all the words of the Lord—all the legislation contained in the last three chapters and a half (Exodus 20:19, to Exodus 23:33), not perhaps in ex…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:3-9
The ratification of the covenant. These verses contain the account of the formal ratification of the covenant between Israel and Jehovah—an event, the most momentous in the history of the nation, big, for weal or woe, w…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:3-8
Man's readiness to enter into covenant with God, and promise unlimited obedience. In any covenant which God proposes to man, the advantages offered to him are so great, and the requirements made of him so manifestly "ho…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:4
Moses wrote all the words of the Lord. We may presume that they were miraculously brought to his remembrance by that Spirit of Truth which guided all the Prophets (2 Peter 1:21; John 14:26). Having written the words, he…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:4
If any man will do the will he shall know of the doctrine. What a man receives must depend upon what he is able to receive. [illustration. The sponge absorbs more water than the wood, because its pores are more open.] T…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:5
And he sent young men. The Levitical priesthood not being as vet instituted, either all the people were regarded as holy, and so any one might offer sacrifice, or the "young men" selected may have been of the number of…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:6
Moses took half of the blood. The blood, which symbolised the life of the victim, was the essential part of every sacrifice, and was usually poured over the altar, or at any rate sprinkled upon it, as the very crowning…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:7
And he took the Book of the Covenant. In this book we have the germ of the Holy Scriptures—the first "book" actually mentioned as written in the narrative of the Bible. Genesis may contain other older documents, inserte…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:8
Moses then proceeded to the final act—He took the blood from the basins, and sprinkled it—not certainly upon all the people, who numbered above two millions—but upon their leaders and representatives, the "elders" and o…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:9-11
The Covenant Meal on Sinai. The Old Testament contains no mention of any other meal so wonderful as this. Newly entered into covenant with God, fresh from the blood of sprinkling, which was representative of the blood o…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:9-11
EXPOSITION THE SACRIFICIAL FEAST AND THE VISION OF GOD. After the covenant had been ratified by the unanimous voice of the people, Moses proceeded to carry out the injunctions with respect to Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and th…
The Pulpit Commentary on Exodus 24:9
Then went up. Compare Exodus 24:1. The mountain was to be partially ascended, but not to any great height. Nadab, Abihu, and the elders were to "worship God afar off."